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Docking
In order to use a station's services, you must dock with the station. Docking is a three stage process: Requesting Docking Permission Before you can get inside a station, you must first ask for permission to land, otherwise you won't have a specific pad to land at and you may receive a fine! Docking clearance is requested via the Contacts tab in the left menu of your ship: enter the Target menu ("1" by default), move to the Contacts tab ('q' or 'e' to switch tabs), select the station (select by using the space bar), and highlight/select the "Request Docking Permission" (using the w, s, and space bar keys). If you were acknowledged, the station will tell you what pad number to land at. You now have 10 minutes to land. Docking Request Denied There are multiple reasons why a docking request gets denied. ; Distance When the distance from you to the station is too large, then a message will tell you to get closer than 7.5 kilometers. When you are close enough you can try again. ; Request from within the station. When you are trying to land and abort the landing for some reasons, you cannot make another docking request from within that station. In that case get out of the station and make another docking request. ; Station is full This quite often happens at the more popular stations and you will have to wait for someone to leave, or find another Star Port to land. ; Ship is too large If you ship is too large for the docking bays at the station. ; Fines When you made a violation against the Station Policy, you will get a fine. Violations include: * trying to land without Docking Permission * trying to land on the wrong Landing Pad * transporting goods that are illegal on this Station * speeding in the Dock * opening your weapons bay within the no fire zone * spending too much time in the docking port To pay the fine, you must find another Star Port within that Star System that still allows you to land. If you are not allowed to land on any Space Station within this star system, you may be able to pay the fine when you get killed. Entering the Station All stations rotate to generate centripetal force, which effectively acts as gravity for its crew and citizens. For pilots, it effectively acts as a huge pain, but it can be dealt with. As you approach the station's entry port, focus on centering your ship with the port first, so that you don't crash into the port's walls. Once you've centered the port, start aligning the ship. This can be done manually, or by pressing the rotational assistance button. If done manually, keep in mind that most ships are wider than they are tall. The entry ports are a congested location with ships passing in both directions. There is no traffic control and you should stay alert to avoid crashing into other ships. Some ships captains have adopted the protocol of turning on ships lights when docking to make you more visible as well as always traversing the side of the entry port marked by the green lights. Not always possible as some of the bigger ships only just fit. Once inside, find the pad with the number the station assigned you, and lower the landing gear. You now need to actually land the ship. Landing Your Ship Landing is simple in theory, but can take finesse if you don't have a joystick throttle. Slowly approach your pad - if you're close enough and landing gears are down, the radar will be replaced with a diagram showing your ship's position relative to the landing point. In the diagram, there is a dot extending from your ship to the pad, like a shadow; you want to get that dot centered with the pad's circle first. When the dot is centered and your craft is aligned (facing the control tower), the pad's diagram will turn blue, and you can thrust down (F key by default) to complete the landing. Use side thrusting (Q and E by default) as well as forward and backward thrusting (W and S by default) to fine tune your orientation and positioning. Once everything is blue and you've touched down, you're done. Congratulations, you're docked! Docking Tips * The docking port on a Coriolis Station is always positioned on the 'end' that is spinning anti-clockwise. Looking for the advertising holograms often helps. * The ship's compass (to the right of the scanner) points towards the docking pad currently allocated to your ship. The yellow indicator will be an outline if the target is behind you. * When landing, you can't see the landing pad, because it has to be below your ship. However, while approaching the landing pad, you ch are directly over the pad. However, enabling the landing gear will also make your ship more maneuverable at lower speed.Wheh are directly over the pad. However, enabling the landing gear will also make your ship more maneuverable at lower speed.Whenee directly over the pad. However, enabling the landing gear will also make your ship more maneuverable at lower speed.